Diseases in industrial cities in the Industrial Revolution

Disease accounted for many deaths in industrial
cities during the Industrial Revolution. With a
chronic lack of hygiene, little knowledge of sanitary care and no knowledge as
to what caused diseases (let alone cure them), diseases such as cholera, typhoid
and typhus could be devastating. As the cities became
more populated, so the problem got worse.

A filthy "Father
Thames"

Cholera was a greatly feared disease. Caused by
contaminated water, it could spread with speed and with devastating
consequences. Not for nothing did the disease get the nick-name "King
Cholera". Industrial Britain was hit by an outbreak of cholera in
1831-32, 1848-49, 1854 and 1867. The cause was simple – sewage was being
allowed to come into contact with drinking water and contaminating it. As many
people used river water as their source of drinking water, the disease spread
with ease.

An attack of cholera is sudden and painful – though not
necessarily fatal. In London it is thought 7000 people died of the disease in
the 1831-32 outbreak which represented a 50% death rate of those who caught it.
15,000 people died in London in the 1848-49 outbreak. The disease usually
affected those in a city’s poorer areas, though the rich did not escape this
disease.

Smallpox made a major re-occurrence in industrial
cities even after Edward Jenner’s vaccine. The reason was simple. Very
many in the industrial cities were ignorant of the fact that Jenner had
developed a vaccine. As Britain continued on its road to a population mostly
centred in cities and the agricultural regions became less populated,
traditional old wives tales and developments linked to them (such as coxpox,
milk maids, Jenner etc) became less well known. Also the overcrowded tenements
of the cities were a perfect breeding ground for smallpox.

Typhoid and typhus were as feared as cholera. Both were
also fairly common in the IndustrialRevolution.
Typhoid was caused by infected water whereas typhus was carried by lice. Both
were found in abundance in industrial cities.

The greatest killer in the cities was tuberculosis (TB).
The disease caused a wasting of the body with the lungs being attacked. The
lungs attempt to defend themselves by producing what are called tubercles. The
disease causes these tubercles to become yellow and spongy and coughing fits
causes them to be spat out by the sufferer.

TB affected those who had been poorly fed and were under
nourished. It also affected those who lived in dirty and damp homes. TB can be
spread by a person breathing in the exhaled sputum of someone who already has
the disease. In the overcrowded tenements of the industrial
cities, one infected person could spread the disease very easily.

Though accurate records are difficult to acquire, it is
believed that TB killed one-third of all those who died in Britain
between 1800 and 1850.

Microbes were only discovered in 1864 by Louis Pasteur.
Until that time all manner of theories were put forward as to what caused
diseases. A common belief - and one that dated back to Medieval England – was
that disease was spread by bad smells and invisible poisonous clouds (miasmas).
Industrial cities were certainly plagued by poor smells from sewage, industrial
pollutants etc. The majority of deaths were in the industrial cities. Therefore,
doctors concluded, the two went together: death and bad smells/gasses.

Such beliefs caused serious problems. In Croydon, typhoid
swept through the town in 1852. The local Board of Health went about looking for
a smell that caused the disease but found nothing. In fact, sewage had seeped
into the town’s water supplies and contaminated the water. It did not occur to
the health officials that the water could be the cause of the disease as medical
wisdom of the time dictated another cause.

Even a great reformer like Edwin Chadwick was convinced
that disease was carried in the atmosphere which had been poisoned by foul
smells. In 1849, he persuaded the authorities in London to clean up the sewers
in their districts. This, so Chadwick believed, would get rid of the bad smells
and therefore disease. Each week an estimated 6000 cubic yards of filth was
swept into the River Thames – London’s main source of water. Cholera was
given a chance to spread and 30,000 Londoners got the disease in 1849 with
15,000 dying as a result.